Real Estate Analyst Interview

gatorman

Know ARGUS (might be dependent on the asset class you'll be working with though), understand how the different metrics work and tie together (NOI, IRR, cap rates, etc.), assuming they have decent deal flow they'll want to know that you can get in there, learn quickly and pick up the slack and actually be a useful member of the team sooner rather than later. I assume this IS team will specialize in a certain asset class within a certain market, so being able to speak knowledgeably about that will help. I'm sure some more experienced guys can chime in on this as well.

Source: Current IS analyst at one of those firms

agreed. I'm a broker at one of those firms. Not only should you know the company's "wheelhouse", you should know the brokers that you will be supporting. Know their backgrounds, their specialities; etc. Look on the real deal; etc & find out what kind of properties they sell usually.

Yeah, I looked on this site using the 'search' feature, and the words analyst + interview didn't show up once. What gives?

I'd need to know a few more specifics to give you a good answer to this, but what I'll tell you is that pretty much anything to do with REIB / REPE you're going to need to know DCFs. It's also likely you'll want to know some basics about REITs and how they're valued, how they're structured, etc... search for that on google and just read some articles for non-professional investors, that'll give you the basics.

UFOinsider -- was referring specifically to real estate analyst interviews and wondering how they differ from a regular superday type interview for i-banking.

International Pymp thanks for the post. The guys I'm being interviewed by are focused on portfolio sales, real estate M&A as well as valuation of property portfolios & real estate assets. So I can guess what they'd ask about the valuations but wondering if they could ask technical questions about sales or would that portion be more geared towards fit questions?

It really depends on the firm and whether or not it's first year analyst, summer analyst, 2nd year analyst, etc... For example, I had an interview to come on as first year analyst at a BB in REIB 2 years ago, and even though I had like 6 months experience in REPE it was like 90% fit questions. They did the "walk me through a dcf" thing, and then they basically just asked about me, my feelings on the market, etc, etc...

I then had an interview like a few months back for a 3rd year analyst position at Lazard in RE IB and I got drilled on a lot of extremely challenging technical questions. Tax implications of M&A for REITs, etc... how the fuck was I supposed to know that coming out of working in REPE in China / U.K. focused primarily on single- sset investment deals and working in different countries with different laws for the last 2+ years... I don't know. They also asked me tough questions about LBO models, specific stuff about normalizing earnings for REITs and other RE companies (hotels), etc...

so basically, it depends. one thing I'll tell you to know for sure is the DCF. Beyond that it's anyones guess.

Search for the previous thread where i asked about this if you like (it was before the lazard interview or a blackstone one in real estate debt strategies - can't remember)... RE_banker had some solid replies about knowing AFFO yield, etc.

RealEstateFinancialModeling.com is currently helping me out HUGELY right now. Well worth the $295 intro course if you have no prior knowledge.

Apologies if posting that site is unkeuth.